Key takeaways

• Thirty-nine states require coursework in personal finance in order to graduate high school.
• Classes focus on skills like budgeting, credit, loans, and taxes to prepare students for adulthood.
• Financial education has been linked to higher credit scores and stronger long-term financial outcomes.

Does your teenager know how to read a pay stub? Or understand how compound interest works? A growing number of states want to make sure high school students have those skills before they begin making a lifetime of financial decisions after graduation.

Thirty-nine states require high school students to take coursework in personal finance before graduating, according to the Council for Economic Education’s latest biennial survey. California, Delaware, Colorado, and Hawaii have added requirements since 2024 for students to take a stand-alone class in personal finance.¹

While some states mandate personal finance curriculums within related subjects, such as economics or social studies, the trend has been shifting toward focused coursework.² About 30 states require at least one semester of a stand-alone personal finance class for high school graduation, up from just 8 states in 2020.^3,4 

Although the curriculums vary from state to state, there’s a common emphasis on practical skills that students can use after graduation — such as calculating  student loan expenses, setting up a budget tracker, or knowing how taxes are deducted from a paycheck.⁵

Georgia, Kansas, Rhode Island, Vermont, and Washington have standards centered around core topics like earning income, spending, saving, investing, managing credit, and managing risk.⁶ Wisconsin’s curriculum covers similar areas along with “financial mindset” — how values, emotions, habits, and external influences can factor into money decisions.⁷

Financial literacy push 

The surge in financial literacy education requirements is not by happenstance. The pandemic exposed how financially vulnerable many Americans are to income disruption and other economic shocks. Higher inflation has added to the financial strain, particularly among those with low savings and high amounts of debt.⁸

More than 1 in 5 (21%) Americans have no savings for emergency event, such as job loss, illness, or big home repair bill, according to Empower research. Nearly 2 in 5 (37%) can't afford an emergency expense over $400.

Financial literacy proponents say required classes at the high-school level can help fill those gaps. Students that take a personal finance course are more likely to have higher credit scores and lower debt delinquency rates as young adults, according to one study.⁹

A focus on managing debt may also help reduce costs for essentials like insurance, auto loans, and mortgages, while learning about investing basics can support long-term wealth building.¹⁰ 

Unique challenges

High school students nearing graduation face their own unique challenges. Two top economic stressors are soaring rent prices and student loan debt, which have outpaced personal income gains in recent decades.11

Recent polls have shown strong demand for personal finance courses from teenagers. Students are most interested in generating wealth, saving money, and avoiding debt, according to one survey. But the poll also found critical gaps in students’ understanding of instruments like stocks and bonds or how taxes work.12

The financial education push in public schools does have some detractors. Some parents view financial education as their domain, not schools. And some have questioned whether teachers have the knowledge and resources to add personal finance to their existing duties.¹³

Read more: Generation Money: Gen Z’s snapshot

Making it happen

Many states don’t have specific licensing requirements for teaching personal finance, but they do require relevant training and endorsements. Students taught by teachers with substantive preparation in personal finance score three times higher on financial knowledge assessments than peers taught by untrained instructors.¹⁵

There’s also been interest in enhancing student financial literacy at the federal level. The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation and other agencies have resources and educator guides on topics like comparing credit cards, the full costs of car ownership, investment vehicles, and understanding compound interest.¹⁶